Lan Ying - Gusu's Third Jade {Being updated}

Chapter One: Thread of Promise {Rewritten}

The winters in Gusu never changed. Crisp, clean, and quiet—the kind of cold that pressed gently into your bones rather than biting them. For Lan Zhan, it was familiar. For Wei Ying, it was exciting. She pressed her small hands against the frosted windows of the Gentian House, watching thin flurries drift lazily down onto the courtyard stones.

She was five now, bright-eyed and soft-voiced, though already quieter than her mother had been at the same age. She carried her curiosity like a lantern—quietly, but without apology.

Inside, the house hummed with gentle preparation. Lan Qiren paced the room with his usual seriousness, adjusting place settings and checking scrolls. Cangse Sanren stood to one side, brushing snow from her robes, while Wei Changze held a tray of sweets, looking a little too stiff for a man married to chaos incarnate.

"I can't believe she's already five," Madam Lan murmured, watching the girl with a fond smile. "She's grown so quickly."

"She takes after her father," Cangse said with a little laugh. "Thank the heavens."

Lan Zhan, now six, sat nearby with Lan Huan, both boys practicing quiet calligraphy. But his brush paused whenever Wei Ying shifted. His eyes followed her in secret, though he didn't know why. She was the only one he didn't mind being near. She was the only one who made the silence feel like something shared, not endured.

Wei Ying, in turn, adored him in the open, like most children love the quiet thing that doesn't push them away. When he didn't speak, she filled the silence. When he listened, she beamed like she'd been heard by the sky.

"Lan Zhan," she whispered one morning while they were painting, "your handwriting looks like a tree branch."

He blinked. "...Thank you?"

She leaned close. "It's a compliment."

From across the room, Cangse Sanren tilted her head at the exchange. "They're too soft with each other," she said under her breath. "It's dangerous."

Wei Changze, who hadn't even spoken all morning, let out a quiet sigh. "They're children."

"That's why it's dangerous."

At midday, the group gathered at the table. Wei Ying sat beside Lan Zhan without hesitation, her head tilted slightly toward him as she dipped a biscuit into her tea. Lan Zhan didn't look at her, but he gently turned the teacup so the biscuit wouldn't fall in.

A-Zhan had never liked messy things.

Lan Qiren watched them quietly. His hands were folded over his scrolls, his expression unreadable. He'd already sensed it—the way his nephew shifted in her presence, the way Wei Ying's voice softened whenever she spoke his name.

He was too old to believe in fate, and too tired to argue with it.

"We wanted to speak with you," Cangse Sanren said, her voice steady but quieter than usual. "About the betrothal."

His eyes narrowed slightly. "You're serious about this, then."

"We are," Wei Changze said, surprising even himself with the firmness of his voice. "But only if you agree. And only if... if you'd take care of her. Should anything happen to us."

The room stilled at those words, as if the very walls had heard something they wished they hadn't.

"I don't plan on dying, Qiren," Cangse added, trying for lightness. "But I've never been good at doing what I plan."

Lan Qiren said nothing at first. He looked toward the children again—Wei Ying now resting her head on Lan Zhan's shoulder, half-asleep, his small hand hovering near hers on the table.

"She'd be safe here," he said finally. "She already is."

Cangse Sanren smiled, but her eyes were glassy. "Then let's give them time. I'll bring her once a month. A week at a time. Let them learn together. Grow together."

Lan Qiren nodded. "We'll revisit the idea when they're older. But this—this I can allow."

~~~

Later that evening, the children sat near the fire. Wei Ying, ever curious, tugged a book off the shelf and tried to sound out the characters on the page. Lan Zhan watched her from behind the rim of his teacup, expression blank except for the small crease between his brows.

"You're reading that upside down," he said quietly.

"I knew that," she said quickly, flipping it around and trying again. "I was just... testing."

He reached over, gently turned the page for her. "This is a better one."

She glanced up at him, lips pressed together to hide a smile. "You're nice when no one's looking."

Lan Zhan didn't answer. He didn't need to.

From the hallway, Cangse Sanren watched her daughter nestled between two quiet Lan boys and felt, with a strange ache, that this was the beginning of something. A thread had been tied, invisible but unbreakable.

"I'll see you in a month," she whispered to no one in particular.

~~~

That night, Cloud Recesses was quiet in the way only mountaintop winters could be. Not the silence of peace—but of anticipation. A hush that clung to the trees, to the windows, to the edges of every unspoken thought.

The adults sat together in the Gentian House, the fire burning low, teacups half-full and growing cold. The children had long since been tucked into bed—Wei Ying curled up beside Lan Zhan on the mat, their foreheads almost touching, soft breath rising and falling in tandem.

Madam Lan had gone to fetch another blanket when Cangse Sanren finally broke the silence.

"Do you ever get the feeling," she murmured, "that something's coming?"

Wei Changze, sitting beside her, turned to look. "Coming?"

"Not something specific. Just... like the world is tilting. And soon, it won't be this quiet anymore."

Lan Qiren frowned. "You've always been dramatic."

She smiled faintly. "And you've always been wrong."

A pause. The fire cracked.

"I'm only saying," she added, voice softer now, "I don't want her to be alone. If we don't come back from one of these hunts... she should already know where home is."

Madam Lan returned and laid the extra blanket over the sleeping children, smoothing the fabric with care. "This is her home," she said simply.

Cangse Sanren's eyes were glass-bright in the firelight. "Then I can go knowing that."

They didn't speak much after that. The kind of conversation they'd just had only needed to be said once. The rest lived in glances, in teacups refilled, in the way Lan Qiren stood before leaving and rested his hand on Cangse's shoulder—not affection exactly, but something close enough to count.

~~~

The next morning arrived quietly.

Wei Ying left with her parents after breakfast, bundled in thick robes and trailing snow behind her like a comet once again. Lan Zhan stood at the top of the stairs, watching her go. He didn't wave. He never did. But she turned anyway and grinned at him with wind-chapped cheeks.

"I'll be back soon, A-Zhan!"

He didn't answer. Just stood there, too young to understand what the ache in his chest meant, and too stubborn to ask why it felt colder when she left.

Cangse Sanren glanced back at the mountain one last time as they walked, her fingers brushing against the small wooden hairpin in her sleeve—the one Madam Lan had pressed into her hand that morning, carved with a cloud motif and a single white rabbit etched into its stem.

"For when she's ready to wear it," Madam Lan had said.

The walk down was long and quiet. The kind of quiet that settles just before something changes.